In the most recent NBA GM survey results, Boston Celtics vet point guard Mike Conley was voted the league's active player most likely to make the transition to the other side of the clipboard to become a head coach. And based on what we heard from the Fayetteville, Arkansas native in a recent interviewwith Athletic senior contributor Jay King, there may be something to that prognostication after Celtics head coach Joe Mazzulla asked him to try on that particular hat with the team in preseason.
"Joe approached me before the game and said, ‘What would you think about doing the rotations tonight?'” said Conley. "I was like, ‘(Expletive), I’ll do whatever.’ I told him I had never done that before and it was cool for me to experience that."
"It’s a
lot harder than you think sometimes," said Conley, reflecting on how the experiment actually went for him.
"You’re looking down, and you’re trying to follow a strict regimen, but then you look up and a guy is winded," he said. "Or a guy maybe made four or five buckets in a row, and it’s like, I don’t want to sub him out yet. It’s just feeling out the game."
"So, I got to sit next to Joe, and he walked me through some things. Just (things like), ‘I wouldn’t take anybody out right now. This five is rolling.’ So, it’s just really learning the mindset of coaching and what it’s like kind of being in control of that."
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This article originally appeared on Celtics Wire: Voted most likely to coach, Mike Conley tried the gig out with Boston Celtics
